The United States and Russia are currently being baited into a war, and we are the only ones standing in their path. The message Jack sends to Elizabeth at the end of “Running With Wolves,” the third episode of Season 3 of Jack Ryan, provides the clearest explanation yet of what the game board’s components represent. The numerous relationships within the already murky world of spycraft, intelligence, and geopolitical intrigue remain opaque. For instance, Elizabeth Wright feels hesitant to totally trust Jack. But when an FBI team arrives in Rome to execute a warrant on her AWOL field officer for violating the Espionage Act – in other words, treason – she finds that the decision-makers above her pay grade have completely left her out of their discussions. Jack is still on the run. However, what he has discovered is not only genuine. It has implications at the highest levels of the world’s power centers. Oh, and a worldwide nuclear catastrophe is also a possibility.
Jack is anticipated to establish touch with Zoya Ivanova in Vienna, Austria. “Your pal is obviously out of practice,” she quips to Mike November, who had been following her. I’ve had him since eight blocks. And Zoya is displeased to see Jack. (“Your cover is not the only one that’s been blown.”) However, she agrees to arrange a meeting between him and her mystery Russian contact, the original source of the Sokol intelligence, who we know to be the veteran of the Russian intelligence service, Luca. Knowing that if he can locate Zoya, so can the CIA, Jack and Mike employ a little of digital deception by hacking the railway station’s security feeds to make it appear that they’re traveling to Semmering, Austria, while they’re actually going to Budapest, Hungary. When you are an international fugitive, sending arrogant FBI officers and your CIA director on a wild goose chase is par for the course.
As the former head of the agency’s Moscow station, Greer and Alena Kovac had a professional relationship. In the Prague president’s office, she greets him pleasantly while Radek (Adam Vacula), her security director who is actually a double agent, looks enraged. Greer explains to Kovac that the dead Russian defense minister was a silent supporter of nuclear disarmament, that Petrov, the new minister and a true hardliner, was likely responsible for the assassination, and that Radek was implicated in the scheme. Kovac had already identified the Petrov link. However, it is Radek’s complicity that shocks her. The president tells Greer that regardless of the game Russia is playing, she will not allow the Czech Republic to remain their playground.
Greer is aware that Alena Kovac is an intelligent politician who will not be pushed. However, she also trusts her father Petr completely, which appears to be an issue. Petr is organizing a party in the wilderness of Bohemia at his hunting lodge, and the first guests to arrive are Zubkov (Ivan Mathias Petersson) and Lychikin (Lenn Kudrjawizki). “The agreed-upon item has been acquired,” says Zubkov, and Lychikin offers him a $20 million bank token as payment. Petr reassures Lychikin that neither Jack Ryan nor the Czech president’s daughter would be an issue, and then he invites a third guest to the lodge. Alexei Petrov is the new defense minister of Russia. It is crucial to their “goal,” according to Petrov, that Kovac grant NATO permission to place weapons in her country. Clearly, Petr’s relationship with his daughter is characterized by both affection and possibility. Nevertheless, he asserts that Alena “is Russian, whether she recognizes it or not.” According to Petr, Russia was once the terror that kept the globe awake at night. And now? “War without cost is without purpose. Without sacrifice, we lack identity.” And the creation of a new Soviet Union is the only identity that these men desire. That is unfortunate for Lychikin. Later, when hunting in the woods, Petr shoots himself in the head. The investor was not a believer. Moreover, there must be no loose ends.
On the train to Budapest, Luca admits to Jack for the first time that he is Zoya’s contact. “We have little time and much to consider if we are to stop Sokol,” he continues. But hold on a second Why would a veteran of the Russian intelligence community seek assistance from the CIA? The older man concurs that being on the same side seems suspicious. In their drive to reestablish the Soviet Union, he continues, Petrov and his government and military partners have already secured the uranium required to construct the Sokol nuclear device. With time running out, he claims he could no longer trust anyone on his own side due to the independent actions of a rogue element inside his administration, and was therefore forced to call the CIA. When you’re a renegade agent like Jack, though, phoning the Company to reveal that your secret intelligence source is actually Russia’s most brutal spymaster isn’t exactly advantageous. “Recall the line I was describing?” Mike tells Jack following their encounter with Luca. “You’ve just gone too far.”
President Kovac is ignorant of her father’s scheme. He appears to hope that her Russian ancestry will persuade her to his faction’s goals. Despite the fact that he has betrayed his daughter’s confidence, he may be underestimating her resilience. With Greer’s proof that the death of the Russian minister was an inside job, Kovac has ordered NATO to station missiles in the Czech Republic. While this is a show of force against Russia’s incursion into Ukraine, it is also just what Petrov and Petr’s cabal desired. It is also a signal that the president does not believe the fabricated allegation of US complicity in the assassination, which will give them a precedent to provoke world conflict. In other words, she is specifying her allies. And with Jack and Mike still in the wind and operating in the shadows, it will not be as easy as these faction plotters believe to bait any country into war.
Johnny Loftus is a free-lance writer and editor residing in the Chicago metropolitan area. The Village Voice, All Music Guide, Pitchfork Media, and Nicki Swift have published his work. His Twitter handle is @glennganges.
»“Running With Wolves” is the title of the third episode in Season 3 of Jack Ryan«